Frostgrave – first game

I brought the Frostgrave rules to the club the other day for a game. Due to some cancellations it turned out that we were only two there. My opponent, Andy, didn’t know the rules and neither did he have a warband. That was a blessing in disguise as we had to go through the rules together and that gave me a well needed refresher. Anyway, I have to say I’m very satisfied with the rules as they were really easy to teach and making a warband with a brand new wizard and an apprentice was done in a rather short time.

We did a straight up game with six treasures to catch. Terrain is some of the stuff I have recently made and some stuff we found at the club.

My warband, from left to right: Archer, wolf animal companion, tracker, crossbowman, infantryman, witch, apprentice, 3 thiefs.

Andy's warband: 3 man-at-arms, apprentice, necromancer, 3 thiefs (I think that was what he choose, I might be wrong here). One problem was the total lack of soldiers with ranged weapons. A big mistake. The necromancer raise a zombie before the game also.

The board after turn one. The six treasures in red circles. Necromancer and warband in green and witch and warband in blue.

Crossbowman and tracker shoots at one of the opposition soldiers and the first man falls. Hooray!

My apprentice moves up and tries a Telekinesis spell on the treasure by the ruin, and fails miserably and takes a wound.

A new round and the wolf attacks the necromancer apprentice while my infantryman moves forward.

The evil (they are Necromancers, after all!) opposition takes all three of 'their' treasures. Things are not looking good.

The zombie shuffles forward and engages my infantryman.

My two thieves secures one treasure.

While my lone mini-thief secures the second treasure and starts to run home while the apprentice covers him. And by the way he fails another spell, this time a Poison Dart to slow the soldier with the treasure.

That wolf doesn't do much damage but neither does the necromances apprentice. Stalemate as the just bang away at each other.

There goes the zombie!

Man-at-arms rushes my shooters and is attacked by my tracker. 

My thief rushes in behind the apprentice, who is now surrounded.

The battlefield. The necromancer is peppered with arrows as soon as he shows himself and he wisely draws back.

The man-at-arms draws back and engages my thief. My witch tries to use Telekinesis on the treasure, fails and is hurt for one health. 

The necromancer apprentice wins over the wolf and pushes him back while the man-at-arms fells my thief. The apprentice rushes up the pyramid to try to stop my thief running away with treasure.

Meanwhile my tracker does what she is good at, and one enemy is down.

Things start to look grim for the man-at-arms.

My bowmen attacks the necromancer. Not looking good for him at all. 

Another man down! My witch finally moves the treasure with a successfully cast Telekinesis.

The necromancer show what he's made of and runs away.

With a well aimed crossbow bolt the necromancer apprentice falls and with that the game is over.

My treasures turned out to be 290 gold coins, three potions (healing, strength and invisibility), a Grimoire with Planar Tear (making it possible to learn that spell) and an Orb of Power. A decent loot I think.

Everything went really smooth even though this was our first game, and I have to say that is entirely due to the really good rules. We forgot a couple of things during the game but figured it out rather immediately and could backtrack (we forgot to deduct the armour value from the damage made the first time I hit and instead of taking out two soldiers I only manage to take out one – not too bad though).

Also we forgot to check what happened with the fallen figures after the game. A fallen fig is not necessarily dead, but he could recover between games. Not a big problem for me, as I only lost a measly thief, but Andy lost his apprentice and a lot of soldiers.

Anyway I let my son witness my dice-rolling and checked for the thief, and he did survive unscathed.

One thing I didn’t think of when I choose spells for my wizard was that you get experience points for taking out enemies and I built my witch as a mostly supportive wizard. So I don’t have any spells that do damage. Well, I bought crossbows for wizard and apprentice and I’m saving money so I can buy and learn Bone Dart. Just a couple of hundred more gold coins and I’m there.

All in all a very enjoyable game and I’m sure to play Frostgrave many more times.